Tejas

The fifth and final installment of the ZZ Top vinyl rips comes to us courtesy of Cosmic Hearse passenger, Deege Dunford, who painstakingly ripped this. Much appreciation goes to Mr. Dunford for taking the initiative and sharing with our dear readers. The following notes come from Deege himself...

These are all the original mixes of the classic '70s ZZ Top catalog.For those of you not familiar with the history of these recordings:Before 1987, ZZ Top's first 7 albums were not released on CD format. So, in 1987, to capitalize on the success of the synth and drum machine

laden sound of Eliminator and Afterburner, Warner Bros Records convinced the band to go back into the studio and remix the back catalog, in order to release a 3-disc compilation of six albums, called Six Pack .These new mixes were terrible - gone was the rawness of what made classic ZZ Top what it was replaced instead with fake, annoying sounding drums and drowned in a sea of cavernous reverb. Some vocal lines and guitar parts were even re-recorded or alternate takes were used, and a few songs were even shortened, so that two albums worth of material could be jammed onto one disc. Fortunately, the band's sixth album, 1979's Degüello was spared this treatment, due to a dispute with Elmore James' estate, over the lisencing of the cover song Dust My Broom. This album was left off of the six pack, and replaced with the band's seventh album El Loco. After the dispute was settled, Degüello was eventually released on CD with it's original mix. In 2003 a 4 CD box set Chome, Smoke & BBQ was released, which contained an abundance of theseclassic '70s recordings remastered in their original mixes for the first time on CD. In 2006, the band's albums Tres Hombres and Fandango! were also remastered and re-released in their original mixes as well. As of yet, ZZ Top's First Album, Rio Grande Mud, Tejas, and El Loco have still not been released in their original mix. In my attempt to finally be able to listen to these albums they were originally meant to sound, on CD, I have spent the last few days compiling the best versions available of these albums in order to make these original versions available to anyone else whose ears were offended by the terrible '80s butchering of these classic albums. Included for download are the 2006 remasters of Tres Hombres and Fandango (live bonus tracks not included, as I wanted the albums to be as originally intended). For these other 3 albums, I have included all of the Chrome, Smoke & BBQ remasters, and for the songs on each album that were not included on the box set, I used versions ripped from the original vinyl albums. In order to make these vinyl rips sound as close to the 2003 Box Set remasters as possible,

I have used the Steinberg FreeFilter Direct-X plugin in order to get an EQ profile of both the CD sourced tracks, and the vinyl tracks - and then the program automatically applies the EQ profile of the remastered tracks to the vinyl tracks. I then used the Waves L2 Limiter in order to make the vinyl sourced tracks the same volume as the CD sourced tracks. In the case of Backdoor Love Affair from ZZ Top's First Album, I used the CD version from 1977's Greatest Hits, as it was released with it's original mix. Surprisingly, it's pretty difficult to tell the difference between the CD sourced material and the vinyl sourced material, and we are finally album to hear these albums as originally intended.

Unfortunatly, I have been unable to find a vinyl rip of 1981's El Loco, so that album is not included here. I am a bigger fan of the band's '70s output anyway, so I am not too worried about El Loco at this point anyway.

Here

Fandango!

Part 4 of Cosmic Hearse's 5 part series of ZZ Top vinyl rips. Fandango was ZZ Top's half live/half studio album. The live side showcases their unstoppable energy, but what a lame choice of material, the studio side smokes, and contains some of their best work. Enjoy.

http://www.badongo.com/file/7449652

Three Guys

Part 3 of my attempt to right a terrible wrong: those shitty ZZ Top remasterings. Tres Hombres was the third album from the three guys from Texas. Enjoy!

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=TVQN3GWV

Rio Grande Mud

Here's the second installment of ZZ Top Vinyl rips. "Rio Grande Mud", the band's second album, came out in 1972. Enjoy.

Here

Han Solo Shot First!

Look, I understand George Lucas' desire to update his original Star Wars with all the latest in CGI technology, but does that make it right? No! The original was great and has been ingrained into our collective psyche as it was in 1977. In my world, Han Solo shot first, and we don't see Jabba the Hut for another few years. These attempts to rewrite history often fall flat and only serve to make the originals, that meant so much to our impressionable minds, hard to find. So imagine my disgust when I picked up the "ZZ Top Six Pack" cd box set. You see, I thought I was getting the first six ZZ Top albums in one handy box, saving myself time as well as money, two things I am painfully short on. But alas for woe, upon placing the cd in the player and hearing the opening launch of "Someone Else Been Shakin' Your Tree," followed by Frank Beard's thud, I felt as if I had been shot in the nutsack under the table by a cocky Corellian smuggler. The warm, homey sound of Beard's finessed playing had been replaced by the overbearing, gated '80s cocaine drum sound that marred ZZ Top's later records. And such is the case throughout all six albums, all digitally remastered to completely whitewash the dusty veneer of these precious albums. Why is anyone's guess, but I blame the age-old axiom that once an artist experiences massive success, they no longer can understand what made them appealing in the first place. An endless file of sycophantic yes-men are ever at the ready to tell them whatever corn-studded turd they are unleashing on their once adoring public is spun of angel hair and gold (see Metallica.) So I don't blame the Top themselves, they are mere mortals and problems have plagued these bearded champions from day one, and perhaps they were eager to rewrite a history that they see as less than joyous. The crime of this remaster of disaster is most evident on "Old Man," the album's only ballad, where Beard's fluttery snare work is totally devoured by that horrid reverb. What is most unnerving to me is that future generations, future civilizations even, might actually think this is what ZZ Top sounded like in the 1970s. Just like if I mention my love for this band to anyone born after 1975 they say "Oh, that band that did "Sharp-Dressed Man." Ugh!
But enough about this holocaust revisionism in the form of a rock and roll album, let's try to focus on what made the Texas trio so badass throughout the '70s. Well, for one, they were amazing players. Jimi Hendrix once sited Billy Gibbons as one of his favorite guitar players, and I have heard that this Jimi Hendrix guy was no slouch himself on the electric guitar. They had a chemistry and a telepathic bond like no other band and this shines through on all of their albums, even the absolutely shitty ones. Yes, they made shitty albums, quite a few actually, but between 1970 and 1977 there was no better bunch of bluesed-out ass kickers around. Then there are the themes explored in these fantastic tunes. ZZ Top songs are about two things and two things only, cars and poontang. Sometimes when you think they are singing about cars it's actually about pussy, and sometimes the snatch is actually a car. No other band has so thoroughly explored the similarities between automobiles and that certain part of a woman's anatomy. When Billy Gibbons sings of barbeque, he does not desire meat slapped on a grill, he only wishes to slap HIS "meat" on some young lady's "grill." The one exception may be "Squank" which seems to carry some sort of veiled ecological message, but then again, I could be wrong and "Squank" could be another euphemism for the ol' stinkin' Lincoln. So here it is, ZZ Top's glorious first album unremixed and unremastered for maximum listening pleasure.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=F9FGA982